Go to CoastalSussex.com to see it!

The Lewes-Rehoboth Canal connecting Rehoboth Bay and Delaware Bay was authorized by the U.S. River and Harbor Act of 1912.

Initially, the canal was envisioned as a means of access to the sea for farmers and saw mills along the Indian River and Bay. Consent to acquire land for construction was granted to the U.S. Government by the Delaware state legislature in 1913. Construction by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was completed in 1927.

Today, this feeder route to the Inter-Coastal Waterway is used by commercial and pleasure boats and provides access for pilot boats to guide ocean-going vessels up the Delaware Bay to the major ports of Wilmington and Philadelphia.

Delmarva Chapter 56, International Right-Of-Way Association.

Coastal Sussex County, Delaware is located on the eastern seaboard of the United States, about a 2 hour drive from Philadephia, Baltimore and Washington, DC. Long a favorite of tourists from those areas, our 24 miles of beaches have become one of the most sought-out destinations for family vacations by people from across the globe.

We have traditional favorites like the Rehoboth Beach boardwalk, where you can ride the rides at Funland, slip into an arcade, and eat some Grotto Pizza, Thrasher’s french fries or Royal Treat Ice Cream. All of this on the mile-long boardwalk that abuts the sand and ocean. Rehoboth’s beach, like all of the Sussex beaches, is Clean Beaches Council-certified as one of the cleanest in the nation. 

To the north is Lewes, which dates back to 1631 and is rich with history. It has miles of beaches as well, including Cape Henlopen State Park, where you can surf-fish, play disc golf, explore the nature center and occasionally see a movie filmed, like 2006′s Failure to Launch.

 In the town’s quaint waterfront historic district, you can dine on fresh seafood or haute cuisine, stroll past the Historical Society grounds, visit the Lightship Overfalls or take a dolphin-watching cruise. Or, if you want, you can take the Cape May-Lewes Ferry to southern New Jersey for the day. 

The area also features tax-free shopping at Tanger Outlets and other locations, lots of boating and fishing opportunities, a few dozen golf courses, waterparks like Jungle Jims, and plenty of nightlife. There truly is something for everyone here at the Delaware Beaches.  

South of the Lewes-Rehoboth area are the “Quiet Resorts” of Bethany Beach and Fenwick Island, with miles of beaches, some of the finest restaurants in the state, as well as shopping, golf and leisure.

All of this, just two hours from a major airport. What are you waiting for? Plan your next vacation to the Delaware beaches!

(If you’re a Delaware beach regular, leave your best beach memory in the comments!) 

His secretary at the time, Dorothy Harrison, remembers the hours as horrendous. “Work with Mr. Rollins was nothing like it was before he came along. I mean sometimes we’d start at five in the morning and go till after dark in the winter, and till dark in the summer. I’d come in around 8:00 and get through at 6:30. Then I’d go back at 8:00 [at night], though I wasn’t told to.        

Rollins invented and developed the idea of automotive leasing during this time, a pioneer in the field, driving contrary to popular opinion at the time, where leasing a vehicle was as accepted an idea as putting a man on the moon.

John Rollins went on to become wildly successful in truck leasing, extermination and various other industries, but that legendary business career started with a simple Ford dealership right here in Lewes, DE.

Five modifiable factors can give a 70-year-old man a 54 percent probability of living to age 90, U.S. researchers found.<p.The study, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, also found five factors that add up to an unhealthy lifestyle, which reduces that probability to 4 percent.

So what are they and how can we live to age 90?

The researchers found the probability of living to age 90 was reduced 44 percent by a sedentary lifestyle, 36 percent by high blood pressure, 26 percent by obesity and 22 percent by smoking. Having three factors together — such as sedentary lifestyle, obesity and diabetes — reduced the probability of living to age 90 to 14 percent.

The final ingredient was exercise, which obviously has positive effects.

This study was conducted only on men, probably because the way for women to live longer was decided long ago: less exposure to men.

In 1701, following a series of raids on Lewes and Rehoboth by pirates and French privateers, assemblymen from the Lower Three Counties of Pennsylvania, as Delaware was then known, requested that William Penn allow them to form their own assembly, separate from the Pennsylvania Assembly. This request was due to the unwillingness of some in the Pennsylvania assembly, mainly Quakers, who didn’t want to provide cannons and other defenses to the Lower Three Counties due to their pacifist beliefs. Penn granted the request.

From this point on, the Assembly of the Lower Three Counties met at New Castle, a situation that would keep Delaware from being part of Pennsylvania.

However, there was one more family, the Calverts of Maryland, who believed the lower three counties belonged to them. The Calverts had a 1632 charter from England which granted them what is now Maryland and points eastward to the Delaware Bay which were not previously settled by Europeans. The Calverts eventually sued William Penn in a court in England for the rights to what is now Delaware.

The case took 70 years to adjudicate, and it came down to one minor detail. The Calverts had been granted in 1632 areas not previously settled by Europeans. The catch? The Zwannendael settlement in Lewes from one year earlier. The court ruled in Penn’s favor, quite possibly the single most important decision in Delaware becoming its own state.

Today, at the site of the Zwaanendael museum, a memorial stands that reads “That Delaware exists as a separate commonwealth is due to this colony.” Truer words were never spoken.